Bella can crown Widdup’s explosive season start

Brad Widdup knows his momentous start to the season will reach its peak soon, but he is hoping filly Bella Khadijah might extend the stable’s purple patch a little longer.

Just over a week into the new term, Widdup has saddled up nine runners for five winners and four seconds.

He sits atop the NSW trainers’ premiership with Chris Waller leading into Thursday’s Newcastle meeting, and while his incredible statistics aren’t sustainable, especially for a smaller yard, he is rapt to have hit the ground running.

“It is a bit unbelievable. The horses we’ve had, they’ve just been fit and ready,” Widdup said.

“I think this weekend will bring me back to reality, but it has been a really good start and it’s just nice to have the horses racing well.

“We’ve been building slowly. We had a really good season last year and the quality of horse I’m starting to get is a bit better.

“We’re consistently rolling up and getting results and that helps as well.”

Bella Khadija will be one of up to two Randwick runners for Widdup on Saturday when she lines up in the Inglis Yearling Entries Close 16 August Handicap (1400m).

The filly began her career with the Hawkesbury conditioner, finishing third behind subsequent stakes winners Switzerland and Castanya on debut in January before losing all chance in the Inglis Millennium (1100m) when she blew the start.

Sent for a stint with Peter Robl in Queensland, Bella Khadija broke her maiden at Doomben last month before finding her way back to Widdup, who has been more than happy to see her return.

“She ran third at her first start and two-year-old racing at that time of year is hard. You’re up against the top dogs,” he said.

“She was probably over the top for that $1 million race, she played up in the mounting yard, she was naughty going to the barriers and she missed the kick. But she still ran the second quickest 600 metres of the race. It was a huge effort.

“She is a bit of a hot filly, there’s no two ways about it, but she has been very well behaved since she has been back.”

Widdup has also accepted with Fun Sunday in the TAB Handicap (2400m) but will decide on Saturday morning whether she runs or heads to a 2000m race at Kembla Grange.

The mare hasn’t been far away in three appearances from a spell and has been twice placed over Saturday’s staying journey.

“The mile-and-a-half suits her, but the benchmarking suggests it might not be the right race,” Widdup said

“We’ll wait and see what happens with scratchings and go from there.

“She is a tough thing, and she always looks outstanding.”

Tyler Schiller has been booked to ride Widdup’s pair at Randwick and Racing And Sports’ statistics show the hoop has a great record for the stable with a winning strikerate of more than 22 per cent and a place strikerate of over 53 per cent.